On the Outside
by Treol
Summary: AU. He never wanted friends. He would have been happy with acquaintances, but like he seemed to know everything, he knew the odds were against him. L just didn't know how deep he was in something he didn't know existed. Yaoi.


Disclaimer: Every character that appears even remotely interesting does not belong to me

Disclaimer: Every character that appears even remotely interesting does not belong to me! Yay!  
So… Alternate Universe… Yes… Fun…  
I'm so tempted to make L some bumbling thirteen year old. I'm settling for eighteen? And adjusting Misa, Light and who else there may be a bit? Well it won't really matter.

Here's to a severely under appreciated couple! There will be yaoi, possibly yuri, and hentai, just don't expect it all at once. No character will randomly decide to screw another for bunnies. If disgust of this story makes you gauge your eyes out, blame the person beside you!

Read and **review** please!

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Tock.

Silence is golden. Silence has the loudest voice. Silence is a source of great strength. Silence is the true friend that never betrays. Silence is the best thing since sliced bread. Silence, silence, silence, silence! One would think that silence was a good thing.

Tick.

Silence was super special awesome! Why was someone so intent on keeping him from experiencing it?!

Tock.

Perhaps he was overreacting. The droning, repetitive bumps of the old grandfather clock were not something to be bothered with! It was simply the sound formed when the analog clock's mechanical devices operated to move the second hand around the circle, which somehow forms two different sounds due to a faulty clog?

Tick.

Who the fuck was he kidding? He hated that clock. It was mocking him, and for the life of him, he didn't know why he couldn't silence the nuisance with a well-placed sledgehammer.

Tock.

If there was a merciful, omnipotent God _anywhere_, the clock would be damned to one the farthest of Hell's seven layers.

Ding… Dong… Blang!

And that concluded L Lawliet's take on theology.

Blang...! Blang…!

The comfort his dark room should have provided continued to ebb as the clock's monotone clangs ticked away the seconds he had in his silent sanctuary. 'Why does it have to be so loud? Something shorter would provide a more accurate time.' True enough, once the clock's ballads were finished, one minute and twenty seconds had passed after the hour. If the machine was really to serve its purpose, L thought the tune should have started playing before the minute hand reached sixty.

Blang…!

Pale, wiggling toes squirmed against each other, like little agitated mice, jerking and twitching while their owner rubbed his feet together, hugging his knees tighter still to his chest. He had been in the same position for the past seven hours, with the soles of his feet and his bum barely touching his soft mattress, staring at the bane of his existence. A delicate hand slipped into too baggy pajamas, working through the once heavy pockets of the teen's bottoms before revealing a peppermint. The lone survivor.

The green and white swirls were calling to him, hypnotizing him more effectively then any swinging pocket watch could. He didn't want it. As always, at that time before he was forced to face the day, he could not stomach even strawberry cake. No one would believe the truth though. L without sweets was like dessert with one 's.'

The mint was thrown across the room, the same spindly hand that held it so gently casting it away as if repulsed. The sweet hit its target, the center of the moving pendulum, encased in clear glass beneath the face of the clock. The swarthy-haired male hadn't missed his mark in three weeks. He still couldn't stop the tune.

Blang…! Blang!

The final strike of the clock was followed by a distorted mockery of Beethoven's symphony no. 9. L was far from a musical artist (he understood and memorized the facts but couldn't _create_ for the life of him), but even he knew how off key the clock was.

Slate eyes blinked slowly while the sylphlike male turned on his side, lying into the barely disturbed covers of his bed, his knees still pressed firmly to his chest. A blanket was pulled to his waist, but L's blank stare remained firmly on the heavy crimson drapes on the far side of the room. His slender form shuddering while he ducked his head lower, making his slight hunch more visible, the young man wanted nothing more than to disappear into himself it seemed. His body curled tighter into his protective ball, shying away from even the protection of his duvet, eyes unable to close for even a moment. Blinking was a rarity.

It was an insomniac's trade, unsightly eye bags, inappropriate yawns and a sheer, desperate need for amino acids. In exchange for a lack of sleep and all its weight, he believed it.

Symphony no. 9 was in D minor.

It took eleven seconds for the six rings to move to Beethoven's creation, another fifty-three seconds for the mutilated symphony to be silenced. To roll out of bed and pull on his silk robe took – on average – two minutes, with five seconds being the time range for error. From a floor down, another one-hundred and ninety-seven seconds were lost, and to take out the keychain in the robe's front pocket a pathetic three. Roughly thirty-five seconds passed afterwards, with only ten more added if a key was accidentally slipped into one of the wrong locks. That hadn't happened and induction assumed it would not for a while.

That left four minutes and fifty-one seconds of pure, unadulterated silence, in which not even his grandfather clock's incessant ticking could affect him. L was petrified. Even his breaths seemed caught in his throat.

Silence was as glorious a torturer as it was described to be.

The door opened, right on schedule, the ashen-skinned teen's calculations correct to the decimal. The door L refused to look at every time he was confined to his room opened, allowing yellow light to pool through. As always, the hallways were illuminated well. They outlined the figure of the robed man perfectly, so his charge could have reason for his heart to stop beating.

He hadn't started breathing yet.

The faint sound of cloth on cloth was heard, as checkered slippers moved over carpet. The last fifteen seconds was the longest, as the teen distantly, completely unintentionally as such futile hope defied logic, prayed for a break in their routine. The weight on his shoulder told him what he already knew. The warm breath that danced over his neck and cheek, the faint scent of halitosis, of dead cells and bacteria, wafted towards him – L could not yet react.

"Good morning, son."


End file.
